


Now and Then Giving

by achray



Category: The Magicians (TV)
Genre: Established Relationship, F/F, Marina's mystery girlfriend, post-episode 4:06
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-02
Updated: 2019-04-02
Packaged: 2020-01-01 06:46:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,348
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18330749
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/achray/pseuds/achray
Summary: “Miss me?” Marina said.“Were you gone?” said Irene.





	Now and Then Giving

**Author's Note:**

> For a challenge that [greywash](https://archiveofourown.org/users/greywash/pseuds/greywash) came up with on dreamwidth, to write Marina with anyone, after her revelations in 4:06. I missed the deadline for this challenge so many times that I lost track of what it was, and yet still only wrote a tiny ficlet. But I enjoyed thinking about this pairing. :)
> 
> Title from Arthur Hugh Clough, _Dipsychus and the Spirit_ :
> 
> I sit at my table en grand seigneur,  
> And when I have done, throw a crust to the poor;  
> Not only the pleasure, one’s self, of good living,  
> But also the pleasure of now and then giving.  
> So pleasant it is to have money, heigh ho!  
> So pleasant it is to have money.

Marina opened the door with a flourish, slightly ruined by the fact that Irene didn’t even turn round. She was sitting at the perfectly polished oak table in the sunlight from the window, frowning at her laptop. The giant bowl of roses on the table near her exactly matched the shade of her silk shirt. Light gleamed on her hair. Marina took a moment to appreciate the sight. She leaned against the doorway.

“Miss me?” she said.

“Were you gone?” said Irene. She typed something rapidly, nails clicking on the keys.

“Oh, you know,” said Marina. “Forcibly kidnapped and locked in a cage, impromptu visit to fucked-up dystopian timelines, horomancy, vodka and having to deal with the terminally virtuous. Typical day at the office.”

Irene glanced round and raised an eyebrow, looking Marina up and down. Marina twisted her hair round her fingers, posing. Distracting Irene from the family businesses, and from her ongoing power struggle with the Library, was a game she played with herself. It was especially addictive because it only worked around half the time. It should have been entirely fucking unacceptable, the way that Irene sometimes looked at Marina, like she’d forgotten she existed, like she was a cat dropping dead birds at the feet of her owner, who needed to be petted absently and then ignored. Instead, it was hot.

Or it was hot _now_. Timeline 23 Marina had pushed, and pushed, and thrown things, and shouted, and accused Irene of treating her like shit, and maybe even _felt_ inferior to Irene and her wealth and her family and her beautiful, unthinking privilege. It was really fucking embarrassing to remember it.

Timeline 40 Marina wore a lot of eyeliner and her tightest leather trousers, and leaned on the doorframe, casually.

“Horomancy?” Irene said. “Hmmm. Yes. There was a woman, I forget her name. Useful?”

Marina shrugged. “Barely. Practically dead. Some fucked-up shit about timelines and cinnabar and whatever.” She thought about Stoppard, and decided not to mention him.

“Oh,” said Irene. She hadn’t entirely lost interest, though. She was still looking at Marina.

“Hey,” said Marina. “Did you decide about your birthday?”

Irene pushed back her chair a little. She tapped a finger on the table. “Perhaps the opera. Or the ballet.”

Marina smiled at her, showing her teeth. “Sure.”

She’d always known that Irene liked the idea that she was from the wrong side of the tracks, brash, uncouth, vulgar. In another life, she’d have gone out and bought a tight dress, heels. In this one, she knew that Irene preferred Marina half a step behind her, a path parting for them in a foyer full of well-heeled matrons: ripped jeans, boots, smudged eyes, tattoos visible, power held in check. Like a – a fucking direwolf, not a kitten. Like someone you wanted to have at your back, when your whole family had died in mysterious circumstances, and the half of the magical world that didn’t want to join your company or your board was plotting to stab you in the back.

She stretched, yawning. “How about you? Any trouble?”

Irene was proving viciously good at managing the family firm and its assorted sidelines, which seemed to diversify daily into new and delightfully illegal markets.

“I met with the Italians,” said Irene, glancing towards her screen. “And with a couple of senators. It was tedious. But the Milan deal is going through.”

“Was it like _The Godfather_? _The Sopranos_?” said Marina. “Anyone you need me to terminate, say the word.”

“Mmm,” said Irene. “I’ll keep it in mind.” She turned back towards the screen. “The lawyers are drawing up the contract.”

Marina wandered over to the table, and stood behind her, a hand on her chair. Irene smelled of roses, rich and heady, and of expensive hair lotion. And of magic, somehow, the new luxury of all the magic you could ever want to use. The screen flickered with figures.

Marina drew out a strand of Irene’s hair between her fingers, tugging gently. She let her hand brush the back of Irene’s neck.

“Are you _very_ busy?” she said.

Irene leaned into Marina’s touch, almost imperceptibly.

“Hmm,” she said. “I will be, once the lawyers get back to me. Conference call. These subclauses…”

She opened an email and started tapping keys, rapidly.

Marina moved round to sit on the desk, her legs nearly brushing Irene’s arm. She felt as though she’d been away for months. She wanted, very much, to take Irene through to the bedroom, carefully undo every button, every clasp, every zip, and then take her apart. What life in another timeline had taught her, however, was that the direct approach seldom worked, on Irene. She liked to make people wait for her. She liked them to be desperate, though not _embarrassingly_ so.

Marina swung her legs, brushing against Irene, and then reached up to unfasten her hair, shaking it loose. She leaned back, on her hands. Irene spared a glance from the screen to give her a narrow look. Marina blinked at her. Then she set one of her boots on Irene’s thigh, pressing gently.

“I know you’ve got things to do,” she said. “Don’t mind me. I can amuse myself.”

Irene’s mouth twitched. She hit a key and the email whooshed away. Then she opened another screen, Marina couldn’t see it from where she was sitting. She moved her boot along Irene’s leg, daring.

“If I were under the table,” she said, as casually as she could, “you could take the conference call, and they wouldn’t even know I was there.” She bit her lip. Irene would never agree, but if she did….the thought of Marina at her feet, touching her, licking her, while she spoke in her cool voice about violence and mayhem and subversion and money…

“You seem very _invested,_ ” said Irene, without looking up. “And the answer is no.” She pushed Marina’s foot away.

Marina pouted. “Long fucking day,” she said. “I need to…relax.”

“Really,” said Irene. “We’re both adults, not adolescents. We can wait.” She wasn’t smiling, but Marina could feel her amusement. Her right hand scrolled rapidly down the screen, and she set her left hand on Marina’s leg, sliding it up the inside of her thigh, with absolute confidence.

Marina’s breath caught in her throat. She tipped her head back a little, showing off the line of her throat. She could feel Irene’s gaze track over her. Irene’s fingers gripped, and released. Her hand moved a little higher, her thumb caressed, and Marina jolted. She looked at Irene, but Irene was seemingly intent on the screen, though her lips were curled.

Marina swallowed. She _was_ feeling a little desperate. The thought of Irene casually touching her, both of them fully dressed; Irene barely bothering to look at her as she got Marina off, so that Marina would go away, would stop bothering her – Fuck, it was good.

The screen trilled. Marina held her breath. Irene’s eyebrows came together slightly, and she met Marina’s eyes. They looked at each other for a moment.

“Ten minutes,” said Irene. “Wait for me in the bedroom, on the bed. And keep your clothes on.” Her fingers tightened, briefly, and then she let go. The trilling stopped, and then started again.

“Yes, ma’am,” said Marina, only half-sarcastic.

Irene smiled at her slowly, with promise, and Marina swallowed. If she were to tell Irene, now, about the magicians, the questers, the ex-golden kids of Brakebills, fucking nerds and hedges and travellers, with some fucked-up god or monster in their midst. If she were to tell her about where Marina had so conveniently left them, they’d be picked up in an hour, swept away, ended. 

If she told Irene, she would certainly have her full attention. All her attention. But, if there was anything she’d learned across her lives, it was that secrets held still more power. Maybe she would give them to Irene as a birthday present. Maybe she wouldn’t.

She smiled back, and slid off the desk, hearing Irene’s perfect voice answer the call behind her. 


End file.
